BlackBerry Co-Founders Bankroll $100 Million Quantum-Science Fund

Mike Lazaridis and his fellow co-founder of Research In Motion are starting up a new investment fund for quantum science.

The two men who started BlackBerry maker Research In Motion Ltd. some 30 years ago are bankrolling a $100 million investment fund targeting commercial applications for advancements in quantum science.

Mike Lazaridis, the former co-chief executive and co-chairman of RIM, said Tuesday that he and Doug Fregin have launched the fund, Quantum Valley Investments. In an interview, Mr. Lazaridis said the fund is aimed at spurring commercial developments from breakthroughs in quantum science—the effort to understand and harness energy at its most infinitesimal level.

Quantum physics has long been a passion of Mr. Lazaridis, who has donated over $200 million to science institutes in and around Waterloo, Ontario, RIM’s hometown. He has funded the Perimeter Institute of Theoretical Physics and the Institute for Quantum Computing at the University of Waterloo.

“We’ve had researchers coming up to us with some really ground-breaking discoveries, and we could see the potential of those things,” Mr. Lazaridis said in an interview here. “This isn’t like venture capital. This isn’t everybody in their garage or dorm room coming up with an idea and getting funded.”

The new investment fund has inked its first deal, Mr. Lazaridis said, without providing details. Investments from the fund will initially center around Waterloo. But Mr. Lazaridis said he could see researchers from other parts of the world eventually approaching him for funding.

Mr. Lazaridis served as co-CEO for 20 years with Jim Balsillie before they both stepped down early last year, as the BlackBerry maker struggled with a plummeting share price and a fast-dwindling share of the global smartphone market.

Mr.Lazaridis remains the company’s non-executive vice chairman and one of its biggest, single shareholders. Mr. Balsillie has been pursuing his own philanthropic activities–including overseeing an international governance think tank in Waterloo. Unlike Mr. Lazaridis, Mr. Balsillie stepped down from RIM’s board last year. Earlier this year, he disclosed that he had sold out of all his RIM shares.

Mr. Fregin is less well-known than Mssrs. Lazaridis and Balsillie, but he appeared briefly on Forbes’ billionaires list in 2008, when RIM shares were trading above $100 a share. RIM shares closed Tuesday in New York at just above $15.

Messrs. Lazaridis and Fregin were boyhood friends. They started RIM in a strip mall in 1984 with a $15,000 loan from Mr. Lazaridis’ parents. Mr. Fregin served as RIM’s vice president of operations until he retired in 2007.

Mr. Lazaridis declined to answer questions about RIM, which rolls out its new BlackBerry Z10 phone in the U.S. on Friday and reports earnings next week.